Looking for Whit’s Frozen Custard vegetarian options? Short answer: almost everything on the menu is vegetarian. Whit’s is a frozen custard shop with no grill and no fryer full of chicken, so you’re not hunting for a safe item the way you would at a burger chain. Whit’s own ingredient chart lists gelatin in two items, the gummi worm topping and the s’mores cookies. Avoid those, pick the classic egg-and-dairy custard or one of two dairy-free bases, and you’re set. Check what’s vegetarian at other chains if this is your first stop, but this one is about as easy as it gets.
A Quick Look at Whit’s Frozen Custard
Chuck and Lisa Whitman opened the first Whit’s in Granville, Ohio, on March 3, 2003. Chuck perfected his custard recipe first, and the couple opened on Prospect Street. Nine months later the shop moved to Broadway. In 2012 the Whitmans sold that original Granville store to local owners, and it’s still open.
Space Cowboys Restaurant Group, a Kentucky-based operator run by Bill Aseere with partners Michael Ash and Mark Halpin, bought the Whit’s franchise system in March 2025. The new owners promoted Kaylyn Bemis, Chuck Whitman’s daughter and the brand’s former VP of operations, to chief operating officer to keep the original recipe and culture intact. Headquarters moved to Independence, Kentucky. The logo got a refresh and a loyalty app followed. Whit’s has grown from 95 units at the time of the sale to 103 US locations as of May 2026, spread across ten states from Alabama to West Virginia.
Custard differs from regular soft serve or ice cream in two ways. Cooks churn it slowly at a lower overrun, so it holds less air, and they add egg yolks on top of cream and milk. That gives it a dense, rich texture. It’s also why the classic recipe can’t be vegan without an entirely different base, which is exactly what Whit’s built with its oat milk and coconut milk options.
Whit’s Frozen Custard Vegetarian Options: What to Order
Whit’s publishes a full allergen and ingredient chart for its custard bases, toppings, and mix-ins. Nothing on it contains meat, poultry, or fish. Two items do list gelatin, which comes from animals: the Black Forest gummi worms and the s’mores cookies, whose marshmallows carry it. Vegan status is a different story. The classic custard, most candy toppings, and anything with whipped cream or hot fudge all rely on dairy or egg. Here’s how the core menu breaks down.
| Menu Item | Vegetarian | Vegan |
|---|---|---|
| Vanilla or Chocolate Custard (classic) | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (egg yolks, cream, milk) |
| Oat milk vegan base | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Coconut milk vegan base | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Fruit toppings (strawberry, pineapple, blueberry, cherry, raspberry) | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Nut toppings (almonds, cashews, macadamias, Spanish peanuts, pecans) | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Waffle cone or cake cone | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Italian ice (lemon, cherry, blue raspberry, watermelon, strawberry lemonade) | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Orange Creme Italian ice | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (egg albumen) |
| Root beer or orange soda (for a float) | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes on its own, ⚠️ Check if floated on classic custard |
| Gummi worms topping | ❌ No (gelatin) | ❌ No (gelatin) |
| S’mores cookies (marshmallow pieces) | ❌ No (gelatin) | ❌ No (gelatin, butter, egg) |
| Hot fudge, caramel, or whipped cream toppings | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (dairy) |
| Candy toppings (M&M’s, Reese’s, Snickers, Twix, Butterfinger, Heath) | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (milk chocolate) |
| Cookie dough, brownie, and cheesecake bites | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (butter, egg, dairy) |
The Custard Itself: Vegetarian, Not Vegan by Default
The classic vanilla and chocolate custard sticks to the traditional recipe: skim milk, Grade A cream, egg yolks, sugar, and nonfat milk solids. It’s vegetarian, but vegans should skip it because the recipe uses both dairy and egg. Vegetarians who eat dairy and eggs can order the classic custard with nothing to check or ask about. Whit’s chart lists no wheat in the classic custard mix, but the same shop handles wheat cones and cookie mix-ins all day.
Beyond vanilla and chocolate, Whit’s runs a flavor of the week. The fall 2026 lineup on its site includes Coffee Fudge Ripple, German Chocolate Cake, Cinnamon Bun, and Caramel Apple Pie. Each one starts from the dairy-and-egg custard, so none of them is vegan. Your server can tell you which mix-ins go into it. A weekly flavor built on s’mores cookies or gummi worms would carry gelatin.
What’s Vegan at Whit’s Frozen Custard?
The menu carries two dedicated vegan custard bases next to the classic recipe. Whit’s lists water, sugar, palm oil, corn syrup, hydrolyzed oat flour, pea protein, and sunflower lecithin in the oat milk base, with no dairy or egg. The coconut milk base adds live yogurt cultures to coconut milk, also with no dairy or egg. Pair either with the fruit toppings, nuts, and cones listed as vegan above. Whit’s chart marks the rainbow sprinkles vegan, but they use confectioner’s glaze, which some vegans skip. Stock varies by store, so ask which vegan flavors are on hand today.
How Whit’s Serves It: Scoops, Whitsers, Whitties, and More
Six serving styles make up the menu, and vegetarians and vegans can order any of them. Scoops are plain custard by the cup or cone. Whitsers blend custard with mix-ins, similar to a Blizzard or a Concrete. Whitties sandwich a scoop of custard between two cookies. Shakes blend custard with milk. Sundaes top scoops with sauce, fruit, or candy. Floats mix vanilla custard with the soda you pick. None of that changes the vegetarian or vegan status of what’s inside. It still comes down to which custard base and which toppings you pick.
Toppings, Sundaes, and Shakes: What to Watch For
Most of the fruit-based toppings, nuts, sprinkles, and syrups on Whit’s official ingredient list are vegan. Leave off the gummi worms. Whit’s lists gelatin in them, so vegetarians and vegans should both pass. The marshmallow topping is a different product, a syrup with no gelatin on its label. Chocolate-heavy and creamy toppings are where vegans need to slow down. Hot fudge, caramel topping, whipped cream, and the cookie dough and brownie bite mix-ins all contain milk, butter, or egg.
Name-brand candy toppings like M&M’s, Reese’s, Snickers, and Twix use milk chocolate, so they’re vegetarian but not vegan. Shakes and malts blend the custard with dairy milk, and the malt powder contains milk too. A vegan base alone won’t make one dairy-free, so ask your store whether it can blend a vegan base without the milk.
Special Dietary Requirements and Allergies
Whit’s chart lists no wheat in the custard mixes or the Italian ice. But the shop handles wheat constantly through cones, waffle bowls, and cookie mix-ins, so cross-contact matters if you have celiac disease rather than a mild sensitivity. Soy lecithin shows up across dozens of toppings as an emulsifier. Tree nuts and peanuts turn up heavily in the topping bar, and Whit’s suppliers process the almonds and Spanish peanuts in peanut oil, so nut allergies need more than a skim of the menu. Egg shows up in the classic custard base and in the Orange Creme Italian ice. Both are easy to miss if you assume Italian ice is always dairy-and-egg-free.
Staff can pull up the full allergen and ingredient chart before you order if you’re managing a serious allergy. Corn syrup and corn starch show up in most toppings and shake bases as thickeners, worth knowing if you’re avoiding corn for any reason. Beyond dairy and egg, the chart shows three animal-derived ingredients: gelatin in the gummi worms, gelatin in the s’mores cookie marshmallows, and honey in a few graham-based items. Vegetarians only need to dodge the first two.
Tips for Vegetarians at Whit’s Frozen Custard
- Nearly every flavor and topping at Whit’s is vegetarian. The two to avoid are the gummi worms and the s’mores cookies, since Whit’s lists gelatin in both.
- Vegans should ask for the oat milk or coconut milk base by name. The classic vanilla and chocolate custard both contain egg and dairy.
- Stick to fruit toppings, nuts, sprinkles, and cones for a fully vegan build. Skip hot fudge, caramel, whipped cream, and candy toppings.
- Pass on the gummi worms. Whit’s lists gelatin in them, so they’re not vegetarian.
- Watch for Orange Creme Italian ice if you’re vegan or egg-free. It’s the one Italian ice flavor with egg albumen in it.
- Check before you order a vegan shake. Whit’s blends shakes with dairy milk, so a vegan base alone won’t make one dairy-free.
Conclusion
Whit’s Frozen Custard is one of the easiest chains on this site for vegetarians. There’s no meat on the menu, and only two items carry gelatin. Vegans get two dairy-free bases, oat milk and coconut milk, to pair with fruit toppings, nuts, or a plain cone. Double-check which custard base you’re getting, since the classic recipe and the two vegan bases sit side by side on the same menu board. For more on eating out without meat, see our full guide to eating vegetarian and vegan at restaurants, or browse the rest of our restaurant guides. Two fellow frozen dessert chains worth a look are Andy’s Frozen Custard and Sweet Frog.
